Melting Stars
by L.H. Knox
Summary: Lexa is a diligent student doing a post-grad degree in astrophysics. Clarke is a loud musician who plays through the night. They live next to each other. Uh-oh. College AU one-shot written with nothing but fluff and inspired by Gustav Flaubert: 'we long to make music that will melt the stars'.


I wrote a short film for class and then I was like THIS IS CLEXA and now here we are.

You're welcome.

If you wanna chat, you can find me at .com

* * *

"We long to make music that will melt the stars." -Gustav Flaubert

/

Lexa lets out a satisfied sigh, sitting on her bed and admiring the room around her. She's just finished unpacking her boxes, meticulously placing every one of her possessions in their precise places. She had left the books for last, and now she sits admiring the bookshelf filled with novels and textbooks. They're impossibly thick, with intimidating titles like 'Advanced Astrophysics' and 'Fundamentals of Space and Time', but they make Lexa's chest swell with happiness whenever she sees them.

It's been her dream to go to space ever since she was a child, staring up at the heavens and feeling as though she belonged among the stars. She had worked her ass off all through her schooling career, as well as playing several sports to stay in top shape. All for this, her post-graduate degree in physics and planetary study at MIT. She would get a job at NASA if it killed her. She would get to space as soon as she could.

She sits in the small studio apartment that's just off campus. Rent is cheap and the building is meh, but Lexa has made a small, neat home in the space that she is proud of. She admires the NASA poster that hangs above her bed before picking up her book (Carl Sagan's Cosmos) and reading for a bit before bed. The silence is intoxicating and welcome after a whole day spent moving and carrying boxes. She doesn't hear the small electric hum that starts at first, but after a moment or two she gives the wall it comes from a curious glance. Soft chords begin to play from an electric guitar, a calming melody, and Lexa smiles as she returns to her book.

And then-

Hell. The chords come loud and fast, a big, heavy tune infiltrating the room and screaming at Lexa. She tries to focus on the page in front of her, but she can't. She reads the same word over and over, unable to form thoughts due to the cacophony that swirls around her. She strides over to the wall, and bangs on it three times. The music stops, and she lies back down with a content sigh.

It starts up again before Lexa's head hits the pillow.

"God damnit," she almost yells, slipping on her flip flops before going to find the guilty neighbour. Who the fuck is this selfish? She thinks. This is a building filled with post-grad students who need their fucking sleep.

She slams on the door three times with her fist. When it opens, she has to remind herself that she's angry, because holy shit, an angel stands in front of her. Her blonde hair is dyed pink on the ends, shaved on one side, and she wears short shorts and a tank top. Tattoos make their way up her arm, swirling black patterns covering the pale skin. The blonde smiles when she sees Lexa, who suddenly feels incredibly self-conscious in her matching pajama set and messily tied-up hair.

"Can I help you?" she asks, ignorant to her crimes. Lexa peers round the blonde and into the apartment behind her. It's also a studio, but moving boxes are still scattered about, and the only thing that looks well cared for is the guitar and amp that sit in the middle of the room. Seeing the guitar fuels her anger.

"You need to shut the fuck up," Lexa says to the girl.

"Excuse me?" she replies, indignantly.

"It's a school night. You need to stop playing that music."

"Well you could at least be polite-"

Lexa walks away before she says something she regrets, or before she accidentally looks at the blonde's bare legs again. She slams her door shut behind her, and lies in bed for a few moments, waiting to see if the music will start back up again. After a few minutes she sighs in relief, and picks up her book. As she begins reading, the music starts up once again, this time even louder and choppier than before. Grabbing her pillow and putting it over her face, she screams into it, muffling her frustration.

/

Lexa exits her room in a rush, hoping to get to campus with enough time to buy a coffee from her favorite spot. She's running on too little sleep, a side effect of her neighbour's incessant guitar playing that lasted for hours. She hears her neighbor's door open and shut, the jingling of keys as she locks it. Lexa groans inwardly. She doesn't want to face the blonde bitch again, especially without coffee in her system. The blonde sees Lexa and stands awkwardly. Lexa curses the girl's skinny jeans and tight top, revealing every curve, every-

"Uh… hi," she says, waking Lexa from whatever trance she was under. Lexa storms passed the girl, muttering under her breath as she goes.

"Asshole." The blonde gapes at her as she passes. Lexa pretends not to notice just how blue her eyes are.

"I'm the asshole?" the blonde calls out as Lexa leaves. "Y-you're the asshole, man!" Lexa smirks, happy to know that she can still make people as nervous as she does.

/

"You look like shit," Raven says as Lexa lands in her seat, puffed out from running across campus to make it on time.  
"I didn't sleep last night," she grumbles, rubbing her eyes with a fist. Raven laughs at her friend.  
"You look like an oversized toddler."  
"A toddler wouldn't be on their way to being valedictorian," Lexa quips, and it's Raven's turn to scowl.  
"You're only beating me because I was recently paralyzed in one leg and had to miss a few weeks of school last year, Lexa."  
"You're still number two," she replies with a laugh as Raven punches her playfully. If it meant her friend could walk again, Lexa would gladly give up her marks, her scholarship, anything.  
"So why are you so sleepy today?" Lexa explained the previous night's incident, of the girl with no regard for others and their sleep schedules.  
"Is she hot, at least?" Raven snorts at the blush that rises in Lexa's cheeks. "That's a yes."  
"She's… obnoxious."  
"Do you want me to kick her ass?"  
"You'd probably just sleep with her."

/

Lexa's gonna kill her neighbour. It's the only possible solution she can think of in her sleep deprived state. Nobody in administration seems to want to help her. Campus police won't respond to her (excessive) complaints of noise. She's all alone, the only person who cares about her plight. Hell, it's as though she's the only person who can hear the music at all; none of the other neighbours seem to care.

It's the first Friday of the semester, and instead of socializing, all she can think about is finally getting a good night's rest. She sits beside Raven in a lecture, taking notes as fast as she can. Raven doesn't bother; she sits sending mass texts from her laptop. Lexa sees an iMessage from Raven pop up at the corner of her screen.

Raven: are u coming to my place tonight?

Lexa: Ugh, what's tonight?  
Raven: a friend i've known since preschool just transferred here and i told her id help her make friends

Raven: her name is clarke

Raven: cute and funny

Raven: you'd like her

Raven: she's a good kisser

Lexa laughs out loud, and Raven soon follows. They get death stares from the people beside them

Raven: jeez, what's up their asses?

Lexa: The need for good grades.

Lexa: I'll come for a bit, but after that I'm going to bed and sleeping all weekend.

Raven: Copy that, Commander.

/

Lexa leaves her apartment and goes to lock the door behind her. She's in her classic Friday night outfit: black skinny jeans, white top, Birkenstock sandals. Her hair is pulled into a messy bun, and she can't wait to drink herself into a comfortable sleep.

"Dear god, could you please get a new weekend outfit?" Lexa hears a familiar voice behind her.  
"Raven? I thought we were meeting at your place."  
"We are, I was just picking up-"

The blonde menace tumbles out of her apartment, and into Raven's arms, hugging her tightly.

Lexa is fucking outraged.

"This is Clarke, your preschool friend?!" Lexa yells, "The neighbour from hell?! You're fucking kidding me!" The neighbour in question turns to face Lexa.

"Oh, don't tell me," she says with a humorless laugh, "this is the science pal you swore I'd get along with?"

Raven looks between her two friends, Lexa's deep frown versus Clarke's crossed arms. They were both petulant children as stubborn as each other. Raven bursts into laughter, big bales of amusement that have her doubled over and holding the wall for support. She wipes away tears with the back of her hand.

"Y'all are too much," she wheezes. "I can't handle this." There's a hint of a smile playing on Clarke's lips, whereas Lexa's are still pressed into a thin, angered line. Eventually, Raven stops laughing, rolling her eyes at Lexa's demeanor.

"I'm not coming," Lexa says, arms folded across her chest.  
"Yes, you are," Raven tells her, "because you are not five years old, and because you're not allowed to cancel on your cripple friend who's only number two in her class." The latina fakes a pout.

Lexa goes to Raven's, but she doesn't talk to anybody and growls whenever she lays eyes on a certain blonde.

/

She'll never make it to NASA, not with a homicide on her record.

Because the only way she'll make it til morning is if she murders Clarke.

Lexa's eyes stare blankly at the screen of her laptop, willing herself to suddenly become deaf.

God forbid, she thinks, then I won't be able to become an astronaut. Instead I'll have to be a janitor or an electrician, or-

"A building super," she finishes, out loud. "Dear god, Lexa, you're a genius," she tells herself.

Slipping on her flip flops, she leaves her room and passes Clarke's, banging loudly on the door as she does so (not that it'll make a difference, anyway). Lexa trudges down the stairs, and into the dark basement, using her phone as a flashlight. She can still hear the faint throb of Clarke's music.

She finds what she's looking for with relative ease, among the cobwebs and abandoned couches. The electrical box sits on the wall, and creaks open under her touch. She locates Clarke's apartment number, and takes a deep breath.

"One, two, three." She flicks the switch, and the throbbing music stops, replaced with a faint 'what the fuck!'.

Lexa bounds back up the stairs and into her room, smirking when she hears Clarke's door open forcefully. Somebody knocks on her door three times.

"I know this was you!" the blonde yells through the door.

"You have no proof!" Lexa yells back, smiling to herself.

The small respite only lasts for ten minutes, when at last Clarke discovers how to reinstate her power. This time, when it starts, it's as though the musician has pushed her amp to the wall her and Lexa share and now the music is more than sound, it courses through Lexa, beating deep in her stomach and making her nauseous.

In a moment of desperation, she throws her things in a bag and heads over to Raven's, her friend's shitty couch better than the cacophony that envelopes the room here.

/

And then, the music stops. One day, two days, Lexa doesn't say anything to Raven- she doesn't want to jinx it. Lexa's so wrapped up in the silence that she doesn't see the sad slump in Raven's shoulders, the melancholy in her brown eyes. A week passes, and Lexa revels in the quiet. Two weeks, and she finally feels as though she's caught up on her sleep.

Three weeks pass, and she gets suspicious.

"So has your friend quit school or something?" Lexa asks Raven as they wait for their lecturer to arrive.

"Huh?"

"Blondie. Haven't heard her playing recently." Raven doesn't react.

"Did she decide to switch to an actual post-grad program?" Raven ignores the comments, focusing instead on her laptop.

"Or maybe she lost a finger in a freak accident and can never play again. But I shouldn't get my hopes up." Raven slams her laptop shut.

"Is your head so far up your own ass that you can't see what's going on?" she says, trying- and failing- to hold back the extent of her anger.

"What's going on?"

"Clarke hasn't been playing because she went home for a week and a half." Lexa snorts.

"Did she forget how to play while she was gone?"

"She went home because her dad died." Okay. Now Lexa feels bad for joking. But Raven stares at her as though she personally killed Clarke's father.

"I don't know what you expect of me, Raven."

"I expect you to realize that I'm upset, Lexa, because I lost the closest thing I ever had to a father and I couldn't afford to go home for the funeral. I expect you to realize that you hating my best and oldest friend has been putting me in an awkward situation. I expect you to care about people other than yourself for once!" Raven gathers her belongings and stands to leave. She stumbles forward, her bad leg betraying her at an inopportune time.

"Are you okay?" Lexa asks.

"Just fine," Raven barks, leaving a stunned and shamed Lexa in her wake.

/

Lexa's surprised when she hears the hum of the amp through the paper thin walls. But the tune that plays doesn't surprise her one bit. It's not loud and harsh, it's soft and sad and it makes Lexa's chest ache because it sounds like grief itself has picked up a guitar. She blinks back tears that threaten to fall and she fights the desire to implode.

She sits still in her chair as she listens to the painful melody. Closing her eyes, Lexa pictures the one person she's ever lost. All elegance and grace, suited to someone a lot older than their sixteen years. Lexa pictures her lying on the grass in the garden, staring into the heavens and the stars that litter the dark night sky. Lexa can smell her perfume, she can almost feel their hands touching. The girl opens her mouth to speak, and-

Lexa's eyes snap open.

Loud crashes come from next door, the crunch of breaking glass, the thud of something heavy hitting the wall. She hears angry screams permeate the air, and Lexa rushes to her neighbour's apartment.

Clarke is red-faced and crying, destroying anything she can lay her hands on. Lexa watches her for a few moments, rooted in shock. Clarke reaches for her guitar, the closest thing to her, and lifts it above her head.

Before it can give her the satisfaction of smashing into a million pieces, it's grabbed from her hands, and for the first time, Clarke realizes Lexa is standing right near her.

"Give it back to me," she cries.

"No," comes Lexa's simple reply. The brunette places it gently against the wall, out of Clarke's reach. Clarke turns her sights onto Lexa. She shoves her neighbour.

"This is none of your business," she yells. "I don't need your pity." She pushes Lexa again.

"I don't pity you," Lexa whispers. Clarke's face scrunches in pain and anger and every emotion in between. She lunges for the guitar, but Lexa intercepts her with a hug, tightly squeezing the blonde girl and whispering soothingly into her ear.

Clarke breaks down in Lexa's arms, their warmth oddly comforting, their strength the only thing that's keeping Clarke from shattering into a trillion pieces. They collapse to the floor in a heap, Clarke crying, Lexa holding her, a ball of tears and grief and pain.

"It's okay, you're okay," Lexa breathes, and for a second, she's not sure if she's convincing Clarke or herself.

/

Lexa stayed by Clarke's side for what could've been hours or weeks or days. She sits there until Clarke has calmed down enough and can breathe properly. She only leaves to make the blonde a cup of tea, because tea solves everything. Clarke takes the cup gratefully, letting its warmth fill her chest.

"At home I had to be strong for my mom because she lost her soulmate," Clarke says eventually. "At school I have to be strong for Raven because he was pretty much her dad, too. Meanwhile, I'm barely holding it together and I can't tell anybody about it."

"I hate to say this, Clarke, but I don't think destroying your room counts as holding it together." Clarke laughs, and Lexa smiles at the melodic sound. Somehow, it makes the next silence almost comfortable. And then-

"Have you ever lost anybody, Lexa?" Clarke asks, before shaking her head. "I'm sorry. That was a very personal question that you most definitely do not have to answer." And for a while she doesn't, because talking about her makes Lexa's chest cave in and her hands shake. Saying no would be easier. But maybe Clarke needs someone who knows how she feels.

"My sister died when I was ten. She was sixteen and she was my whole world. She was the one who first taught me about constellations and the planets and how space holds secrets that man would just never know. She told me that if I worked hard enough, I could go to space and be among the stars. I never felt like I was made for earth. I always thought that part of me was made of stardust, that half of me lived in the heavens and if I made it there, I'd find what was missing. And Anya, she was pure starlight. She was fierce and smart and she made me feel like I was more than just ten years old and stuck stuck on earth. And then one night, I made her take me to watch a comet shower about an hour from our place. We were in the middle of this big deserted field, with the longest grass I'd ever seen, and Anya positions my reclining chair perfectly, and stands up to fix her own. And the comets hadn't even started yet and… and this shot rings out. And I look around wildly because I don't know what was going on, what was happening. And when I look back to find Anya… Some idiot redneck had been out 'night hunting' and thought she was an animal…" Lexa lets her words trail off, swallowing the lump in her throat, and wiping away the angry hot tears that pool in her eyes. "It's one thing to lose some close to you," Lexa whispers, "It's something else to lose someone because of you." Clarke squeezes her hand, and Lexa turns to look her in the eye.

"Don't let anybody tell you it gets easier, because it doesn't. Time goes on, and that ache will sit there deep in your gut, but sometimes it'll be mixed with a funny memory, or something that makes you laugh. It'll get easier to laugh over memories, but missing them? Needing them so desperately you think you'll fall apart? That doesn't stop. But that ache is what makes you know that they were once here." Clarke nods and they're both crying and they're both messes just sitting on the floor of Clarke's room. Lexa doesn't tell her about the harder stuff, like how Clarke will forget the sound of her father's voice just like Lexa has forgotten the sound of Anya's. She doesn't tell her about the days she'll want to just curl up, the days she'll wish for an end to existence, because she can't make Clarke sadder than she already is.

/

They don't talk about the night in Clarke's room, because what is there to say? Lexa apologizes to Raven and Raven forgives her. She gives her a friend a shoulder to cry on, hoping that maybe it'll ease the pressure on Clarke. They go to class and they do homework, and just when Lexa thinks about inviting Clarke out to get a drink-

Music comes crashing through walls loud and fast, embedding itself in Lexa's mind and thoughts. It stops as abruptly as it starts. Lexa can hear the muffled sounds of Clarke talking on her phone, followed by her door slamming.

Well this is it. It's now or never.

Lexa creeps into the hallway, checking that nobody is there. She knocks on Clarke's door, and when there's no answer she pulls her handy lock picking set she had gotten from Anya on her seventh birthday. It had seen her through thick and thin, and this time it was going to bring her serenity. The door opens with a satisfactory 'click', and Lexa enters the room.

/

Lexa doesn't even flinch when the door opens with a bang. She doesn't look up from her laptop, instead she sits and continues her note-taking. A large textbook sits open beside her, and calming classical plays from her speakers.

"Where the fuck is it?" Clarke yells, swinging Lexa's chair around so the brunette has to face her.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Lexa replies evenly.

"My aux cord. I know you took it. Give it back." Lexa stands from her chair, pushing Clarke backwards.

"Not until you agree to stop playing your shitty music all through the night!" Lexa snarls at the blonde.

"You can't expect me to stop playing! I'm a musician. I need to practice!"

"Yeah, well not at two am on a goddamn school night."

Clarke takes a menacing step towards Lexa.

"Give me my cord back."

"No."

"Give. It. Back."

Lexa strides right up to Clarke, their faces almost touching. She smirks slightly, knowing that she has the upper hand against the now desperate blonde.

"Make me," Lexa whispers menacingly.

And then they're kissing, Clarke surging forward, a tangle of lips on lips and fistfuls of hair. Lexa's body feels as though she's been set on fire, hot and heavy, cooled only by Clarke's touch. It was as though their bodies had been created to do this, as if they were made of the same stardust finally returned together after millennia apart.

They break apart, gasping for air, and despite the fact that her neighbour is still in her arms, Lexa misses Clarke with a terrifying ferocity. She's only ever felt this way for the stars, yearning to be near them, as though she were incomplete without their shine. And now she thinks that maybe Clarke is of the sky, a star fallen to earth for the single purpose of meeting Lexa.

And this feeling scares the shit out of Lexa. She barely knows Clarke, and what she does know of her is that she's obnoxious and crass and plays loud, heavy music that doesn't let Lexa study. Clarke stands, searching for god knows what in Lexa's eyes, and Lexa can't bring herself to meet the blue that holds what may be the answers to the universe.

"I'm sorry," she breathes, "I have to go."

Lexa grabs her phone and dashes from the room, leaving Clarke alone and confused.

"This is your room!" Clarke calls out after her.

/

Lexa takes a deep breath before knocking on Clarke's door. It's been two days since their kiss and she hadn't the courage to face her neighbour yet. She can hear the music stop, and she braces herself as the door opens.

"Lexa," Clarke greets, surprised to see her standing there.

"Hi." Neither girl says anything, instead their eyes meet, green and blue colliding, saying more than their words ever could.

"I, uh, I brought you a present," Lexa finally says, holding a box out towards Clarke. The blonde gasps as she sees the high quality headphones that Lexa has bought her. "The guy at Best Buy said that they should fit most amps, but if they don't then you can return them and find ones that will fit."

"Lexa, this is too much."  
"It's honestly no problem. Also, they are most definitely an investment." She smiles as Clarke laughs out loud, the sound a music that Lexa could listen to constantly. "Oh! And there's something else." She pulls the A4 sheet from her backpack. Clarke's eyes light up.

"Is that what I think it is?"  
"I'm a person with minimal interests."  
"I'll put them up straight away." They fall back into silence, Lexa hovering awkwardly in the hallway, unsure whether she should stay or go.  
"I'll, um, I'll head off, then," she says, and turns to head back to her room.

Her key is in the lock when she hears Clarke call after her.

"Pick me up for dinner tomorrow at seven, Lexa. Is that time good?"

"Perfect," Lexa grins in response. She doesn't stop smiling once she's in her room. She falls onto the bed, replaying her conversation with Clarke over in her head. She feels something beneath her back, and finds a CD case, the blank disc inside colored brightly with Sharpies. A sticky note on top has the messiest writing Lexa has ever seen, and there's absolutely no doubt as to whose handwriting it is.

Maybe this is more your speed.

Lexa injects the disc into her laptop, and smiles stupidly as the music begins. It's a guitar, but it's acoustic and classical and calming. It's perfect.

/

Clarke lies on her bed in almost-darkness. She stares at the ceiling, now covered in Lexa's second gift- glow in the dark stars that stand out against the blackness of the room. She smiles content, planning tomorrow's date in her head.

/

Lexa lies on her bed in almost darkness. She stares at the matching set of stickers currently stuck to her ceiling. Clarke's mix CD plays softly in the background, filling the room and filling Lexa's heart. She thinks about space and Clarke and that maybe Clarke holds just as many secrets as the universe does.

She sneaks a peak at the wall she shares with her neighbour, and smiles. When she does eventually make it to space, Lexa thinks that she'll have to take Clarke with her, because she belongs to the blonde just as she belongs to the stars.


End file.
